Hylissang surprised to win Fnatic MVP

Hylissang picked up the first personal award of his career

​​​​​​​Zdravets 'Hylissang' Galabov was voted Fnatic's AMD MVP for his performance throughout the LEC Spring Split.

The Fnatic support finished ahead of his team-mate and fan-favourite Martin 'Rekkles' Larsson and was surprised to be the recipient of the award.

He said: "I'm really surprised but am pretty glad that people have noticed what I'm doing.

"To overshadow some of my players on my team is quite an achievement for me and I'm just really happy.

"I always expect Rekkles to get it if anyone and if not then Bwipo or Broxah. They are playing really well so I wouldn't have expected to be picked for it."

Hylissang admitted it was the first time he has received an award for recognition for his performances and he has even felt undervalued by Riot Games.

Rekkles was the 2018 Spring Split MVP

He said: "I've felt pretty underrated by Riot in the past so maybe the fans saw that and felt that I deserve to be recognised for something?

"I've always felt like this a little bit but it never really bothered me until one of the games against G2. I watched it back and I was expecting a little bit of praise or something from the casters but there was nothing, they didn't even mention me at all.

"I actually felt really sad after that but luckily when I checked the comments and on Twitter, the fans were saying things like 'Hyli was great, he helped the team!' and that made me feel better.

"I'm happy people can recognise what I do and I've spoken to Riot about it so it's a bit different now."

The award came at a good time for Hylissang, who suffered a playoff knockout with Fnatic after they lost to Origen 3-1 in Rotterdam.

The 2018 Worlds finalists had a terrible start of the LEC Spring Split season but managed to turn it around in the second half and Hylissang admits his team were too concerned with impressing the fans rather than concentrating on working together.

He said: "Coming off the back of a Worlds' final, everyone had really high expectations, we were expected to stomp Europe.

Hylissang felt undervalued by Riot

"When we went to play LEC and it wasn't working week after week, we learnt to set our expectations a lot lower but at the same time having the goal to reach the playoffs no matter what.

"We started to play as a team again whereas in the first few weeks we were maybe trying too hard to make highlights and impress instead of focusing on objectives.

"After some help with sports psychologists and stuff we managed to change our mentality, it wasn't easy but learnt to prepare and it helped us to play better on stage.

"We didn't get to do what we wanted to do this time but I have full belief in us next split."